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Daily Archives: December 20, 2010

New GAO Reports: K-12 Education, Federal Lands, Medicaid Outpatient Prescription Drugs, Neighborhood Stabilization Program, Public Health Information Technology

  • K-12 Education: Many Challenges Arise in Educating Students Who Change Schools Frequently, GAO-11-40, November 18, 2010
  • Federal Lands: Adopting a Formal, Risk-Based Approach Could Help Land Management Agencies Better Manage Their Law Enforcement Resources, GAO-11-144, December 17, 2010
  • Medicaid Outpatient Prescription Drugs: Estimated Changes to Federal Upper Limits Using the Formula under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, GAO-11-141R, December 15, 2010
  • Neighborhood Stabilization Program: HUD and Grantees Are Taking Actions to Ensure Program Compliance but Data on Program Outputs Could be Improved, GAO-11-48, December 17, 2010
  • Public Health Information Technology: Additional Strategic Planning Needed to Guide HHS’s Efforts to Establish Electronic Situational Awareness Capabilities, GAO-11-99, December 17, 2010
  • Telecommunications: FCC’s Performance Management Weaknesses Could Jeopardize Proposed Reforms of the Rural Health Care Program,
    GAO-11-27, November 17, 2010

  • Telecommunications: Information on Participation in the Rural Health Care Pilot Program (GAO-11-25SP, November 2010), an E-supplement to GAO-11-27, GAO-11-25SP, November 17, 2010

FTC Announces Increase in Maximum Charge for Extra Copies of Credit Reports

News release: “The Federal Trade Commission announced that the limit on how much consumer reporting companies are allowed to charge consumers for an extra copy of their credit report will increase from $10.50 to $11.00, effective January 1, 2011. The FTC is required to review the maximum credit report charge each year under the Fair… Continue Reading

FTC Staff Submits Comments to Federal Reserve on Making Fair Lending Law Stronger

News release: “The Federal Trade Commission staff has submitted comments to the Federal Reserve Board recommending ways the Board could strengthen the rules under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, which requires some mortgage lenders to collect and report loan data that the government uses to analyze whether they are complying with fair lending laws. In… Continue Reading

Brookings Report – Plan A-Minus for Afghanistan

Plan A-Minus for Afghanistan. Michael O’Hanlon and Bruce Riedel.Center for Strategic and International Studies, The Washington Quarterly, 34:1 pp. 123-132, Winter 2011. DOI: 10.1080/0163660X.2011.538308 “Rather than conceding at least one-third of the country to extremists and reducing NATO forces quickly, the United States should tie its force drawdown to the growth and maturation of Afghan… Continue Reading

Yale Law School Mourns the Death of Professor and Librarian Emeritus Morris L. Cohen

News release: “Yale Law School Professor Emeritus and Librarian Emeritus Morris L. Cohen, who directed two of the world’s most esteemed academic law libraries, passed away Saturday, December 18, 2010, at his home in New Haven. He was 83. Cohen was one of the towering figures of late 20th century law libraries and among the… Continue Reading

White House – Overview of the Afghanistan and Pakistan Annual Review

Overview of the Afghanistan and Pakistan Annual Review – Overall Assessment: “The core goal of the U.S. strategy in the Afghanistan and Pakistan theater remains to disrupt, dismantle, and eventually defeat al-Qa’ida in the region and to prevent its return to either country. Specific components of our strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan are working well… Continue Reading

A Half-Empty Government Can't Govern: Why Everyone Wants to Fix the Appointments Process, Why It Never Happens, and How We Can Get It Done

A Half-Empty Government Can’t Govern: Why Everyone Wants to Fix the Appointments Process, Why It Never Happens, and How We Can Get It Done. William A. Galston and E.J. Dionne, Jr., The Brookings Institution, December 14, 2010. “Abuses of the confirmation process, far from strengthening the executive’s accountability to the legislative branch, instead call forth… Continue Reading

Broadband satisfaction: What consumers report about their broadband Internet provider

Broadband satisfaction: What consumers report about their broadband Internet provider, FCC Working Paper, December 2010: “Most Internet users have a very good understanding of the information on their bills regarding how to contact customer service or the price they pay. However, when asked about the clarity of information on their bill about speed, restrictions on… Continue Reading

Higher Education, Lower Admittance Rates

News release and related charts: “For the first time, Harvard topped over 30,000 applicants for the Fall 2010 admission season. Despite a down economy, students are swallowing the bitterly high tuition fees and applying at record highs this year, leading schools to accept fewer applicants. Here’s a closer look at why admittance rates are down… Continue Reading

Facilitating Access to Copyright Works for Visually Impaired Persons

Stakeholders’ Platform Launches Project to Facilitate Access by VIPs to Published Works: “An unprecedented initiative to facilitate access to published works by the visually impaired and the print disabled was announced on October 23, 2010, in New Delhi, India at the 5th meeting of WIPO’s Stakeholders’ Platform. The Platform approved the launch on November 1,… Continue Reading

What Is the Price of College? Total, Net, and Out-of-Pocket Prices in 2007-08

What Is the Price of College? Total, Net, and Out-of-Pocket Prices in 2007–08, Christina Chang Wei, MPR Associates, Inc. and Tracy Hunt-White, National Center for Education Statistics “Included in this report are the average prices paid by undergraduates attending one of the four major types of institutions: public 2-year, public 4-year, private nonprofit 4-year, and… Continue Reading